Can't Help Falling in Love
by BellaSalvatore1918
Summary: Based off of The Prince & Me. Aspiring doctor, Lucy Taylor, never believed in the idea of love. Playboy Prince, Damon Salvatore, wanted more from his life. When Damon convinces his parents to let him attend college in America, the last thing he expected to do was fall in love with a mechanic's daughter, and the last thing she expected to do was fall in love with him, too. Damon/OC
1. Chapter 1

_**What **_**is with the new stories?! I know, right, I've got like 8 stories to handle now. But, I like it. It'll give me something do over the summer, and right now, I'm liking how I feel about all of them. This was a story that I had taken a poll to see which one everyone wanted first, and this one was its victor so congrats, here's the story :) It's not going to be a long one, but if everyone likes this, I can try and do the sequel...but make it better. You know, keep the actress the _same. _God, that pissed me off in the movie. Oh, well. **

**So, if you didn't get the hint from the summary, this story is based off of the movie, _The Prince & Me. _I figured, with all of the dark clouds that loom over all of my stories, we need a story that's just a good old-fashioned...chick-flick, basically. Except...it's a ****chick-fic...haha. I made a joke. **

**I apologize for the many scene changes in this chapter...this won't be so prominent once Damon is at Whitmore because, obviously, he'll be in the same town/time zone. I am also aware that there is no constitutional monarchy in Italy...I mean, I'm not _that _dumb. But, for sake of this story, I didn't feel like changing Damon's last name and/or just ignoring the issue and making him Danish, so he's the Prince of Italy instead. Makes more sense, right?**

**Characters are all human in this story, obviously. Uhm, and some of the characters will just be there to be there; in other words, I just needed a TVD character to fill the part. Elena's not in this...for now. Anyways, enjoy the story. Review if you can at the end. **

**Disclaimer: Only saying this once. I do not own the movie, _The Prince & Me _(but I do recommend that you see the first one. Second one's...eh, because they changed actresses for Paige) or the TV show, _The Vampire Diaries, _obviously, or any of TVD's characters. I do, however, own my writing, whatever storyline I could possibly come up with on my own, and my original characters. **

* * *

**Chapter 1**

**Mystic Falls, Virginia**

Complete concentration was the one thing Lucy Taylor admired herself on—she could be in an airport for all she cared and, as long as she had an assignment to do and the tools in her lap, she'd be good to go. Focus was the key to this, and passion was the key to focus. Give her an unnecessary lab to work on and she'd do it—that was Lucy's primary instinct, to focus on her work. Ever since childhood, she'd been that way; it wouldn't necessarily be considered a sort of _pushover _maneuver…it's not like she'd up and murder someone if the first person she saw asked her to. It was her own passionate means about science that focused her to do the job at task.

But, with focus sometimes comes neglect. This was something Lucy had to work on since the eighth grade, when she had been focused on reading during class and her teacher had her sit in lunch detention for neglecting the most important task at hand. So, with practice, she was able to train herself down to the wire when it came to being interrupted in the middle of her concentration, and that's what turned her around when she heard a chorus of voices.

"Surprise!"

She jolted in the slightest at the scare, but turned around to face her three supervising doctors at the Mystic Falls General Hospital that had helped her throughout her summer internship with them. On the right was Doctor Grayson Gilbert, with his brother, Jonathan, on the other side, and Doctor Meredith Fell was sandwiched in between them. In Meredith's hand, she held a plate with a piece of tiramisu that had a candle lit in the center to celebrate the beginning of her last year of undergraduate school and the end of summer.

"What's this?" Lucy breathed, a smile spreading across her lips as she rose from the chair she was positioned at. She had been working on a summer project that she was to complete for the beginning of the semester in a few days—that's what she'd been so focused on.

"It's your typical…breakfast-slash-dessert dish…" John Gilbert told her, his voice trailing off at the end. "Ah, Grayson was in charge of the food. I was on candle duty."

Grayson shrugged beside Meredith. "Hey, it's not my fault! Miranda decided to make tiramisu and she would've killed me if I walked out with anything _but _that for you," he defended himself, giving Lucy a smile. "She says good luck."

"Tell her I said thank you. And, thank _you_," Lucy said, turning to both Meredith and John to thank them as well. "This is…amazing. Dessert for breakfast, what more could a girl ask for?"

Meredith shrugged. "I don't know…a _bagel _maybe?" She rolled her eyes teasingly. "Should've never let these two idiots in charge of the food."

Lucy laughed, as did Grayson and John. "Well, I never told you all, but tiramisu is my _favorite _dessert," she said proudly, giving them all a smile.

They all smiled back at her, and John responded, "Good luck this year, Lucy. You're almost there," he said, trying to encourage her. She grinned at him, but then was pressured by Meredith to blow out the candle, which was about to drip wax onto the dessert. So, with haste, Lucy rushed up to the candle, held her hair out of the way, and blew.

* * *

**Rome, Italy**

The sound of ear-wrecking tire screeching brought the attention of the townsfolk from their conversations and to the reckless car that stopped in the middle of the road, put the car in reverse, and hastily drove backwards into the parking spot and pulled the car to a halt. The first to get out of the standardized black BMW was Lorenzo, more commonly known as Enzo, who shut his door and buttoned the jacket of his suit before opening the passenger seat door of the car, letting the passenger out first.

Stefan Salvatore exited the passenger car, almost dry-heaving over the pavement. Enzo gave a sad look at the young male before returning to his duties and moving around to the other side of the vehicle, all while hearing, "You are _not _allowed to drive anymore, brother!"

Enzo held open the door for the driver of the car, and out stepped Damon Salvatore, who just laughed to himself as he walked around the door so Enzo could close it. "You're too quick to judge, Stefan. I'm an _excellent _driver," Damon retorted, taking off his dark sunglasses in the process. Stefan just shook his head while he rose from his passenger seat and shut the door on his own. In front of them, everyone stared, but only a group of people really mattered to Damon and Stefan.

"Hey, what happened to the Lamborghini?" Elijah, Damon's racing partner for the day, asked as Damon, Stefan, and Enzo approached the table in which the young man in a classy suit was sitting at. Alongside him were his sister, Rebekah, his brother, Finn, and Finn's…girlfriend, more or less, Sage.

Damon waved his hand. "I'm quite bored of the Lamborghini. You'd be surprised how many there are back in England. You ready to lose?" He stuck out his hand for Elijah to shake, and the classy friend of his did just so.

Damon had just returned from a large escapade in England, paid for in full by his parents, who had given in by only the third time he asked. After a few weeks abroad, though, Damon was already bored of the place. He liked it, sure, but Italy was his home. At least…sometimes it was. Sometimes, he just wanted to get out of the place—but he didn't know, exactly, where he wanted to run.

Elijah scoffed as they broke their hands apart after the manly shake. "I've won Grand Prix," he boasted. "What have you won?"

"Nothing."

"And you think you're going to beat my brother in your mummy's limo?" Rebekah taunted at Damon, her eyes full of that fire Damon had seen countless times again. Rebekah was a feisty one—always the dramatist. She was headstrong and…sometimes, quite annoying to him, but that didn't make her any less beautiful.

"To be correct, Miss Rebekah, I'm going to beat your brother in my _mummy's _limo, to which I've made _numerous _modifications." His statement was almost sung melodically, and quite condescendingly. Damon turned to Elijah. "You should be afraid, my friend, _very _afraid."

Enzo scoffed beside him. "Not half as afraid as you're gonna be when your _mummy _finds out." Damon frowned at his caretaker, who had made everyone laugh at him. Even Damon somewhat laughed, himself, but the laughter was soon gone when it was time for Damon and Elijah to get into their vehicles and race.

Enzo was the one to stand at the starting point with the white flag. "Racers ready…!" he prompted loudly, but a less enthusiastic voice followed after he heard the rev of both engines. "Go."

He dropped the flag and as soon as it was released, the two racers pressed down hard on their accelerators, and the race was on. Luckily for them, the streets were cleared of all people for this very event.

* * *

Mystic Falls was a small town—consistent of only a population around six thousand people. Practically secluded from civilization, it seemed quite unnecessary to have a decently large hospital, but even the doctors in the town were surprised at the dumb mistakes people made all of the time. When Lucy arrived back to her modern, suburban home, she rushed upstairs immediately to get changed.

"Hey!" her mother, Samantha, called up the stairs, peeling her eyes away from her work. "How was it?"

"It was great!" Lucy called out from the top of the stairs. "We had going-away tiramisu for breakfast! Miranda made it for me!"

"Oh, that was nice of her!" Samantha conversed in a loud tone with her daughter. "I'll have to remember to thank her!"

"I already told Grayson to, but you can tell her if you want," she protested as she walked into her room without wasting a second—she had none to spare. Grayson and Miranda Gilbert were practically family—actually, they _were _family on some level. Alaric Saltzman was Samantha Taylor's cousin, and he was married to Jenna Sommers, Miranda's sister. If blood ties didn't lie, that meant that Lucy had no blood relation to Jenna and Miranda, but because of the marital ties, she was related to them. For holidays and special events, they would all get together and would spend quality family time with each other. The town had been the place of birth for all of them—families rarely moved out of the town, there just wasn't any point to it. Lucy was the first one who even considered the idea.

"I will! Miranda, Jenna, and I are all meeting up for coffee later."

"Well, tell them I said hi!" Lucy shouted down from her bedroom, but was grabbing her dress from inside the closet as she spoke. A silence passed before she shouted, "Time check?"

"Nine forty-five!"

Smirking to herself, Lucy unclipped the dress from its hanger, ripped off the tag, and set it down on her bed. Remembering what she needed to do when she came home, she gasped, walked over to her desk, grabbed a green pin, and walked over to the map on her wall and pinned it in the place she had in mind.

It didn't take her long to get dressed, and ten minutes after the time check, she was rushing out of the house and saying goodbye to her mother, who hadn't moved from the moment she walked in. On her way out, she could see the feet of her father, who was working on the car in the outhouse that they had turned into a garage a _long _time ago—probably before she was even born. Without any further speaking, she climbed into the crappy car she was allotted during her time in Mystic Falls, and she started the engine, pulling in her dress while closing the door, and she took off towards her destination.

Time moved faster as vehicles before her moved slower, and she nervously tapped her hands against the wheel. It was painfully approaching ten o'clock by the second, and she was in a hurry. Was it a good time to probably finish one last hour of work before heading back to Whitmore College? No, probably not, but she did it anyway. That, however, was pure devotion to her passion.

Thankfully, she arrived at a decent—yet still _belated—_minute, and she quickly pulled into one of the parking spots, opened the door of the old, rusted-down car, and was subject to everyone in the bridal party staring at her. She gave a sheepish smile and nodded to the bride, "Beautiful dress."

* * *

Damon and Elijah approached their final stretch on the race. The two of them, in their separate cars, could very clearly see the police officer standing at the finish line, waiting for them patiently. Damon was in the lead by a full car length—Elijah in his custom, fast-equipped BMW right behind him. The rounded a curve, speed was lost, and all of a sudden, they were neck and neck. The rush of the race set in as Damon tried to accelerate his speed to beat Elijah, but Elijah's engine was _obviously _faster than his, despite the improvements he'd made.

Still, Damon wasn't going down without a fight.

His speed increased, and he _knew_—just _knew_—that he was going to win, fair and square. It was when Elijah's speed _decreased _that Damon shouted, "Shit! No!" and banged his hands against the wheel in protest. And here he had the slightest hope that he would win fairly.

The cars were pulled to the side of the road, the race finally over, the rush gone. A group of people waited for Elijah and Damon to get out of their cars by the finish line. Elijah got out of his car first and made headway for Damon's car, in which Damon opened his own door this time and sadly walked out.

"Good race, Your Highness," Elijah praised, impressed. He held out his hand for shaking, and Damon took it with grace, even though he was pissed.

"Yes, well, it wasn't the _exact _way I wanted to win," he returned. "It would've been much more satisfying if you hadn't lifted your foot off of the pedal at the end."

Elijah shook his head. "No, you did great."

"I'm quite impressed, myself, _Prince Damon_," Rebekah teased, coming up beside Damon with a sly smile. "You actually _did _manage to beat my brother."

Damon rolled his eyes. "Did you even have a doubt?" he retorted, but no more time was wasted before he pulled her into his arms and she kissed him, straight on the mouth. Kissing Rebekah, though, was like kissing any other girl—satisfactory. Suddenly, Sage came up beside him, and _this _was the part where Sage's terms with Finn became the more-or-less type. She kissed him, too, taking turns with Rebekah for the attention of the young prince, and the three hardly noticed the two paparazzi men taking pictures of them at the site.

* * *

"And, then there were two…" Lucy trailed off, sighing, as she watched one of her friends get dragged away by a dance partner, leaving her alone with Vicki Donovan, her best friend since elementary school. Vicki had always been getting in trouble since day one, but Lucy had always separated her personal life from her actual life.

"It's not _that _bad," Vicki tried, a soft expression. "You know, getting married—"

"Trust me, you don't have to give me the entire spiel," Lucy teased, giving Vicki a smile. "I get it, I get it. You fall in love, you get married…it makes sense to some people." She picked up her champagne glass and sipped it before putting it down with a sigh. "I just wish that it could go back to the way it used to be with everyone. Boys and girls segregated on the playground, afraid of catching _cooties_," she taunted.

Vicki laughed. "Those were _dark _days, Luce. _Dark _days. Besides, once you find someone of your own to love, it won't seem so…_different_."

Lucy shrugged. "Ah, I don't know. The whole concept of this thing just stresses me out. It's not like I have _enough _to stress about, right?" She laughed. Vicki, who had been sipping her own champagne at the time, made a sound in the back of her throat before returning to speaking.

"Hey! I thought this was a no-school talking zone! Don't make me slap you!"

"All right, all right." Lucy held up her hands. "I just…I can't _wait _to finally get out of all of it. See the world. I mean, this should be something you want to do! College degree or not," she said pointedly, but it wasn't meant to be degrading, but rather sensitive and inspirational at the same time. "We're the last holdouts, Vick."

She expected Vicki to say something in agreement—Vicki always wanted to see the world. Instead, Vicki dropped her eyes, conveying her guarded emotion. Lucy could see that _something _was wrong, but she was never one to recognize a feeling based on a look. It was only when Vicki raised her left hand and revealed the engagement ring on her finger when Lucy realized. "Don't hate me," Vicki pleaded. "But Tyler and I are engaged."

"No, no, Vick, that's…that's wonderful." But, on the inside, it was more the _Tyler _part that was worrying her. Tyler Lockwood getting engaged? It seemed…well, it seemed _highly _unlikely. But who was she to judge? "Why do you think I'd hate you?"

"Well," Vicki said, in a slightly brisk tone. "I mean, you're _so _against marriage and I just thought—"

"Hey, marriage is _my _problem, not yours." Lucy gave her friend a smile and leaned over to hug her. "I'm so happy for you two." It wasn't a lie, it was the whole truth and nothing but. She was just skeptical of it; that was all. And, part of her, deep down, realized that she was the only one without a boyfriend or someone that she even _liked. _But she shook the thought off of her now—school was more important than the person you woke up to every morning; the person who could promise you a lifetime of heartbreaks. No, Lucy Taylor was not one for marriage, but it wasn't her place to go knocking on other relationship doors, looking for a way to ruin them. She wasn't _bitter. _

"Oh, thanks, Luce," Vicki said, genuinely smiling this time. But a sight caught her eye, and she nearly freaked. "Aw! Look, Lexi's throwing the bouquet!"

Lucy turned around and watched as Vicki immediately went up to the crowd and waited for the bouquet that Lexi Branson was throwing as the typical tradition of marriage. It was at that moment, with all of the desperate, pleading girls thinking that catching some simple bouquet would automatically make them the next to get married, that Lucy realized something. If she was _ever _going to get married, it wouldn't be around other people like this. Her mom, her dad, Alaric, Jenna, Grayson, and Miranda—that's all she needed. Even friends weren't on the immediate list, though she wouldn't mind their presence. It was big white weddings like these that had ruined the idea for her.

And what do you know? Vicki caught the bouquet. _It must be psychic, _Lucy thought to herself; and this time, the words were bitter.

* * *

Stefan was quite annoyed with his brother for being so late; after all, he was being forced to be picked at by Giuseppe and Mary Salvatore, his parents, who were making sure he was completely presentable for this important meeting that his brother didn't seem to think was all that important. Damon was always like this—late to everything that he was supposed to be on time for, and _still _late for the things he was supposed to be late for.

Mary paced in the room while Giuseppe just stood in front of the portrait of him, waiting. Stefan's mother was beyond angry. "He is late _every _single time," she accused.

"Believe me, Mary, I'm aware," Giuseppe grumbled under his breath, and that was the exact moment that Damon emerged from the connecting room, Enzo right with him, making sure that his sash and medallions were on right.

Stefan went up to his brother and turned sharply by his side. "Where were you?" he asked under his breath.

"Busy," Damon returned, earning an annoyed glance from his brother as the staff to call to order banged against the floor and announced the presence of the royal family.

"His Majesty, the king. Her Majesty, the queen. His Royal Highness, the crown prince. His Royal Highness, Prince Stefan."

Damon sighed to himself at the repetitiveness of this situation. He was sure it was a pain for his family, but it was more of a pain for him. His life, as he viewed it, was a constant routine of three things—royalty, sex, and consequences. For once in his life, he just wanted something to give. He wanted something that was out of the ordinary; something that was _different_—real, maybe. As far as he could see it, there was nothing in Italy that was giving him what he wanted.

And he so _badly _wanted to change it. But, for that moment, he had to smile and pretend that everything was fine for the sake of the people. After all, it was always for the people.

* * *

**That's the end of the first chapter. Sorry it might've been short, I'm kind of trying to be temperamental with the scenes. Maybe, if the chapters usually come out long enough, I can do them scene by scene with the movie (though there will be new/different parts), but this was just the introductory chapter. Next chapter, it'll get into college and all that. Again, sorry it was short. It's never my intention. **

**I hope you enjoyed it anyway, and, if you can, please tell me what you think in a review :) I'll update ASAP. **

**_Love, _  
**

**_BellaSalvatore1918_**

**_X_**


	2. Chapter 2

**Hey, everyone. This chapter's longer than the last one, thank God. Sorry the last one was short, but I didn't want to rush into things. As the story progresses, it'll get longer, and there will definitely be more scenes than those that are in the movie. I'm even incorporating some of the deleted scenes, too. I'm predicting somewhere around twenty chapters, give or take. The sequel all depends on you guys :) But we're not there yet, so no stress right now. **

**Enjoy the chapter! I'm assuming all of you know that Damon is in Italy and Lucy is in America...I didn't put the location at the top because I did in the last chapter. I mean, it's pretty self-explanatory in the description paragraphs, so yeah. Review at the end if you can!**

**Disclaimer: Refer to Chapter 1 :) By the way, in this chapter, it mentions that the Grill is at Whitmore College. No, that's not a mistake. The only place to work in Whitmore is that weird bar/library place, and they never actually give it a formal name, so I just moved the Grill to Whitmore instead. **

* * *

**Chapter 2**

As the morning sun beat down, Brent Taylor pulled up to the curb of the Whitmore College dorm room, where he parked his car so that his daughter could get out. All around them, the campus community was buzzing with students who had arrived in the past week for the beginning semester. Luckily for Lucy, it was her last year at the in-state college, and she would hopefully be moving onto Harvard University with the help of financial aid. After all, the daughter of a mechanic wasn't exactly loaded.

After getting her luggage from the trunk, Brent gave his daughter a hug outside of his parked car, letting it last as long as he needed to hold him over without the presence of his daughter for the next few months.

"Do well, Luce. Study hard," he commanded, but his tone was gentle and almost teasing. Lucy laughed, but she knew that her father was serious, too, on some level. He was the one who pushed her harder when she was younger—he wanted her to be someone that he never could. That's why the money didn't matter. He would a way when there was no way to get her into a good graduate school.

"I will," she promised. "Thanks for the ride, Dad."

"You're welcome." Lucy gripped the handle of her rolling suitcase and slowly started to walk away. Brent walked around to the driver's seat of his car, but then he shouted, "Love you!"

"Love you, too!" Lucy said to him, getting further away by the moment. But Brent, the hovering parent, spoke again.

"We'll see you at Thanksgiving, right?"

"Right!" she called out to him, chuckling under her breath. "Bye, Dad."

"Bye, Luce." With his hands leaned against the roof, he watched as his daughter gave him another smile and went inside of the dormitory to her room.

The room assignments didn't change—it never did in Whitmore. So, Lucy kept her eye on the room number that she'd been returning to for three years now, the room that she shared with her now best friend. Once opening the door, she found it already being vacated by that said friend, who gasped when she saw the blonde walk in.

"Lucy!" Hannah Carter exclaimed as her best friend walked into the room, and she jumped off of the chair she'd been standing on to hang a poster above the new television set.

"Hey!" Lucy returned as her friend pulled her into a hug. They'd been assigned the room together at the beginning of their freshman year, and were now the definition of best friends. "How's it going?"

"Good! How psyched are you to be back?"

"Pumped," Lucy returned, a sarcastic smile on her face. Hannah laughed as Lucy bent down to grab the suitcase that she'd let slip out of her hand while hugging Hannah. "But this year, we need to do the dishes every three weeks whether we need to or not," she said pointedly. She turned back to Hannah and gave her another smile. "And…by 'we', I mean you."

Hannah scoffed, but didn't say anything as Lucy brought her things into the adjoining room of the exceptionally large dorm room. She was stationed at one of the bigger dormitories at Whitmore—there were many more much smaller than hers. It was just pure luck. Suddenly, Hannah gasped, pulling Lucy back to the room with confusion after putting her things inside.

"I almost forgot! We have cable now!"

When Lucy exited her room, sure enough, there it was—the flat screen television mounted on the wall with a bunch of cables hooked up to it. Lucy gasped, too, at the new addition to their room.

"How the _hell _did you manage that?" Lucy asked, walking over to Hannah's side. The brunette just flipped her hair, turned her head, and smiled.

"Daddy." Both of them laughed. "Hey, he may be completely inaccessible emotionally, but at least he over-compensates."

Lucy scoffed. "Yeah, no one's complaining. It's too bad I won't be able to watch much of it, though." She sighed heavily and turned on her heel to go back in her room. "I've got a _five-hour _Chem lab, plus med-school applications…_and _work on top of all of it."

Hannah groaned and jogged over to her friend's adjacent bedroom. "Hey! Classes haven't even started yet. How about you take a break from saving the world and come to the Grill with Caroline, Bonnie, and me?" she suggested lightly.

The Grill was a bar/restaurant on campus, one that was legendary to all of the college's students. Everyone crossed paths with it from time to time—the facility was the ultimate hangout place. Matter of fact, it was the only hangout place unless the outdoor view was counted. Because of this, Lucy, Hannah, Caroline, and Bonnie all swung open the doors, listening to Caroline tell her story about her summer trip.

"So at this point of the trip, me and the other tour leaders are just…we're fed up with all these rich, snotty kids and all of their complaining!" Caroline Forbes explained, hearing protests and laughs from the band of girls listening to her. Caroline, like Lucy, had come from Mystic Falls, and they'd known of each other since the first grade. Their paths had never really crossed until the first year of college in Psychology 101. Bonnie had been a discovery of Hannah's, since the dark-haired, petite girl had been in one of her classes. Ever since that first year, the four of them had formed a merry band of friends.

"So one night in London, we go to this bar," continued Caroline as they continued into the facility. Caroline's voice grew light and almost fickle. "And…well, I was so drunk that I…"

"Oh, God," Bonnie groaned as Hannah picked out a table that was free and they all walked over to it. "Caroline, what did you do?"

Caroline's cheeks turned cherry red at the embarrassment. "I…kind of slept with a forty-five year old cheesy British guy."

The girls around her chorused an expression of their disgust, and Caroline immediately defended herself. "I was as drunk as a skunk! I had no idea what the hell I was doing! And…he was okay-looking…"

"A forty-five year old British guy?" asked Hannah in disbelief. Caroline shrugged. "Come on, Care. That's just…low."

"Again, I was drunk!" Caroline laughed, and before anyone could get out another word, Liz Forbes, Caroline's mother, walked over to the table at the wrong time. Just like Caroline, Liz Forbes had bright blonde hair—but it was cut short instead of long like Caroline's. Caroline, it seemed, had not gotten her fashion taste from Liz, because the restaurant owner wore sensible clothes as opposed to Caroline's tasteful ones.

"What's this about my daughter getting drunk?" asked the curious mother, who looked down at her daughter with a teasing smile. It was still a prompt to answer her question, regardless of the slight tease in the gesture. As Caroline responded, her mother put down the beers for the twenty-two years old around the table.

"Nothing, mom," Caroline said quickly, giving a soft chuckle. "Nothing, I was just telling everyone about my trip this summer."

"Mm," Liz agreed, rolling her eyes in the slightest before smiling across the table. When her eyes finally drifted over to Lucy, she inhaled sharply. "So, Luce, you want back on the work rotation?"

"Yes! Please, that'd be great," she said immediately, leaning forward so that her finger traced over the rim of her cup.

"How's tomorrow?" Liz asked. Lucy made a disapproving sound.

"Mm…how's Thursday?"

Liz frowned at her. "How's tomorrow?"

With a soft chuckle, Lucy agreed. "Okay, then, tomorrow it is," she complied, giving Liz a smile. The strict, yet still loving Forbes mother gave Lucy a small pat on the back and smiled at everyone.

"Okay. This round's on me," Liz offered them, which earned a chorus of gratitude from around the table. Once Caroline's mother was gone, all four girls raised their glasses up high and then banged them together lightly in a square, making sure not to spill any of the alcohol. They, once again, chorused a cheer, and then drank.

After the first sip, Lucy turned to Caroline to continue the conversation. "I can't believe you got to see most of Europe. It sounds like so much fun," she admitted in a saddened tone.

Caroline nodded. "It _was. _Trust me, you'll get there. And you'll love it. Promise." A wide smile spread across her face, and then Lucy sighed, not so in favor of Caroline's prediction.

"I just wish I could fast-forward through the next five years—"

"Oh." Hannah groaned, holding up her hands and closing her eyes. "I _hate _when you start to talk about your 'life plan'. It makes me feel like I'm doing _shit _with mine!" she complained.

"Tell me about it," Bonnie agreed, throwing a pointed glance at Lucy. "Luce, I've changed my major, like, _ten _times!"

"I don't even _have _a major!" Caroline protested, her voice high-pitched.

"Oh, please." Bonnie waved her hand. "By the time you get one, Lucy will already be done with Harvard."

"That's if I get in," the subject of this entire topic interjected, which earned a round of positivity and a little bit of distress from around the table.

"You'll get in!" Each of the girls shouted at her simultaneously, to which Lucy shook her head.

"No!" she countered. "Not after this semester! I'm being required to take Shakespeare. It's some sort of stupid humanities requirement." Lucy scoffed. "I mean, who even _uses _Shakespeare anymore? The guy was a total phony, anyway! Wasn't _Romeo and Juliet _just a rewrite of some Greek story, anyway—?"

Hannah held up her hands and shushed Lucy, interrupting her. "That's it! The next time you talk about classes…or work…or Shakespeare, _you_ are doing a shot." This earned an agreement from around the table.

Lucy sighed and leaned back in her seat, but she felt like the conversation wasn't finished. "It's just that Shakespeare is so useless, I don't see the point in—"

"Ah! Stop!" Hannah silenced her with a shaking hand, and then she got up, searching the tables for what she wanted. The table behind them, luckily enough, had harbored an untouched shot of unidentified liquor, to which Hannah took from them with a few weak protests. When she turned around, she placed the shot in front of Lucy. "There you go."

"Oh, come on…" Lucy trailed off, but Caroline and Bonnie were already on board with the shot idea. Lucy sighed and brought the shot up to her nose, where she sniffed it and gagged. "No! No, what the _hell _is this?"

"Hey, you were the one who brought up Shakespeare! Now you pay the price," Bonnie warned, earning another heavy sigh from the blonde being punished.

"Drink it," Hannah pushed, her voice dragging out. The rest of the girls raised their beer glasses and Lucy had no choice but to raise the tiny in comparison shot glass to their drinks. With another few clinks and a chorus of cheers, Lucy was shuddering before she completely knocked back the shot, groaning while she tasted the unidentified liquid. It was a strong burn all the way down her throat, and it instantly began to intoxicate her with just the slightest taste.

She put the glass on the table and groaned. "Why? Why am I friends with you guys?" she teased, earning the rest of them to laugh. It was a while before things settled down, and at this silence, Bonnie turned her head to Lucy.

"Okay, so what's the deal?" Lucy raised an eyebrow at the question. "Come on! You and Klaus! You've been in Mystic Falls all summer; you were _bound _to run into each other. What happened?"

Lucy dropped her eyes and thought a somber word: _Oh_. She, unfortunately, had seen Klaus, her ex-boyfriend, gallivanting around town with the parade of girls around him, as usual. Things were rough, she couldn't deny that—_and _there was the slight notion that she had seen him around at the wedding she'd gone to. He didn't come over to talk to her, but she could just feel him staring like he was burning her soul with his eyes. Klaus, obviously the ladies man of Mystic Falls, was always confused to how Lucy Taylor had managed to be the one to break it off before he could. It was intriguing, and it was frustrating. She'd known this was the case, but she didn't care. He was selfish and shallow and, at times, not very kind. He was a distraction against her ultimate goal—and he was a distraction she did not need or want, frankly.

Caroline, however, was not so resistant to his charms. They dated for a while, if memories served Lucy best. The ending was mutual, but nevertheless, Caroline still harbored some resentment. This was evident when Caroline just suckled on her beer like she wasn't even listening.

"Nothing happened," answered Lucy honestly. "We didn't really talk to each other much. I don't think I'm all that important to him anymore—finally." She sighed exhaustedly. Being with Klaus was a _task _rather than an activity. She was just glad it was done with.

Caroline scoffed, her tone slightly bitter. "Please, Luce. You're the one girl who's ever broken up with Klaus. If you even know him at all, you'd know he's just trying to see who cracks first. He'll get to you eventually."

Lucy looked over at Caroline with soft eyes—not eyes that were jealous or angry. She didn't blame Caroline, but she also felt like she didn't need to be blamed, herself. She wasn't even friends with Caroline when she and Klaus dated, and they only dated for around six months. Nevertheless, to Caroline, it was completely useless trying to convince her that there was nothing there anymore. Caroline Forbes, by simple nature, was a jealous human being. Not that that was a bad thing, it was just inconvenient at times.

"Nothing happened," Lucy repeated slowly, earning Caroline to shrug and just lean back in her chair with her beer. Bonnie and Hannah just stared at her, and Lucy did the same thing—grabbed her beer and sat back in her chair. "Seriously. I'm done with Klaus, and to be honest, I'm in no mood for a relationship right now. No distractions."

Though they seemed to be skeptical of her, Lucy didn't care. She meant what she said to Vicki at the wedding and she meant what she said to her friends now—no distractions this semester. It was the home stretch to her dream.

So she smiled and brought her glass up to her lips and didn't speak one more word on the topic.

* * *

"Did you read all the prepared research materials?" Giuseppe asked his son briskly as they walked with the men behind him accompanying them to the meeting with the Prime Minister about the worker's force.

"Of course," Damon answered his father, feeling slightly constrained in his suit and tie. It was an outfit he had to wear quite often but never really liked it. He shifted uncomfortably, trying to get in a position where he wasn't choking. But, he still kept his back straight and proper without thinking—a natural European habit.

Giuseppe seemed to doubt him. "Damon, one day you will be the fifty-first ruler of this monarchy."

"Yes, I'm aware father—"

"It's a monarchy that still requires the participation of the king in the workings and decisions of the government," Giuseppe continued as he pulled them both to a stop. Damon was already bored of the conversation. "So if I ask you if you're prepared, it's not an insignificant question that is meant to be brushed off as you regularly do."

Now the young prince was just annoyed. "Father, I'm _prepared, _okay?" It was his overly proper way of saying to his father that he wanted the conversation dropped, and with a sigh, Giuseppe just moved forward and watched as the doors opened. The herald went first, routinely announcing the presence of royalty.

"His Majesty, the king," Immediately, all personnel inside of the large meeting room stood to accept the presence of King Giuseppe, who walked forward with slight annoyance towards the frivolousness of his child. One man followed Giuseppe, and then the herald spoke again, "And the Crown Prince."

Damon walked into the room, watching with already a deep understanding of boredom at the very dull and plain library while his father shook hands elegantly with the prime minister. Following in his father's footsteps, Prince Damon walked forward and shook the prime minister's hand as well.

"Prime minister."

"Your Royal Highness."

The man behind Giuseppe pulled out his chair, and while the prime minister and the prince both walked to the center table, Giuseppe began, "All right, ladies and gentlemen. Let's get started."

Not even fifteen minutes had passed and Damon felt like he was ready to stab his eyes out with the pen he held in his hand. He'd already done everything humanely possible to keep himself awake. Instead of focusing on the boring conversation that surrounded him, he sketched in the book that was supposed to be used as a guide for the meeting, but he honestly didn't care. An hour passed, and he was still bored out of his mind, feeling like he was going to implode. Even his eyes wandered to one of the women councilmembers on the other side of the table; she was quite taken with his looks as every other woman in Italy.

"But a six-percent pay increase is the least the national unions will accept," the prime minister argued with the man on his left in a hushed tone. Everything else was pin-drop silent.

"That's unconscionable."

"Look, if we can't agree here, how are we going to get the two sides together?"

"This is blackmail."

"All right, we'll have to make other concessions then."

"Is there no end to the worker's demands? Our government _must _refuse to give into the unions at all costs."

Giuseppe intervened now, stopping the civilized fight before it really broke out. "I appreciate your arbor, Thomas, but I assure you, they are very serious about the deadline. Without concessions, they will strike," he warned.

Meanwhile, Damon just crossed one of his arms under the other and began to doodle on the notebook again out of sheer boredom. It took everything in him not to fall asleep right then and there.

The prime minister agreed with Giuseppe's statement, "A nationwide strike will be _disastrous _for our economy."

Suddenly, Giuseppe turned to Damon. "Damon, I'm sure we'd all like to know what you think."

This was no doubt a test given from Giuseppe, but it was a test that Damon was not prepared for. He was barely aware of the question until a few moments later, when he dropped his pen and looked around the table, straightening.

"S-Sorry," Damon stuttered, completely taken off guard. "What was the question?" The two men across from him just simply straightened out of annoyance, and Damon realized that he was going to be in a lot of shit for this. He immediately began to close the notebook he'd been doodling on. "I was…I was busy." The notebook closed with a slam, and he crossed his arms over his chest, a clear admission of guilt, but it was merely because he was so disinterested he didn't even care.

Giuseppe sighed. "I see."

No one asked him questions after that—it was pointless. At this point, Damon was enraged when he was finally let out of the meeting and was accompanied by Enzo to his room. Damon was shouting at this point, just completely fed up with his father and the politics that surrounded his birth.

"I don't know why my father insists I go with him!" he complained, unbuttoning his jacket and angrily throwing it somewhere carelessly, where he knew Enzo would pick it up. "I've always _detested _those meetings."

There was a loud swiping sound, and Damon caught the foil blade he'd forced out of its holder, and he caught it in his hand with his fingers gripped around the handle.

"Yes, sir," Enzo agreed without giving much thought to the question regarding the complaining adult he was obligated to take care of. Straightening Damon's carelessly thrown jacket, he handed it to the doorman, folding it neatly as he continued, "Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that, uh…oh, I don't know. You're going to be king someday."

Damon swiped at the target he had standing in front of him in his room. He swiped at the target, was given the foil back by the inertia that bounced it back to him, all the while turning on the television with the click of a button in his left hand.

"Yes, _don't _remind me, Enzo." Again, he hit the target, and then grew bored of the activity, swinging the foil towards Enzo, who caught it as he'd done so many times before. "You're very lucky you're not me, let me tell you."

Enzo sighed. "If you want to change places, sir, call me day or night."

While sitting down, Damon began to feel the constriction of the tie tightened around his neck again, and he immediately brought his hand up to the tie and began to pull it out. In no time, he had it slid off his neck and onto the floor, and tossed it up for Enzo to grab. He was feeling jittery and holed up, which caused him to loosen the buttons on his shirts and take off the sunglasses that he'd accidentally left on his eyes.

As Enzo grabbed the tie, Damon spoke angrily, "You know my mother's going to go crazy when she finds out what happened today. It's a speech I _definitely _don't want to hear. What I'm not quite grasping is why _Stefan _doesn't have to attend these meetings! If anything happens to me, he's next in line," Damon argued.

Enzo returned the tie to the servant who was putting Damon's jacket away, and he spoke to Damon at this. "Your brother does not need to worry about such things until they happen, Damon. Besides, if I'm not mistaken, I'm almost certain that he's attended once or twice."

Damon groaned, but he was no longer on the topic. "I need to get out of Italy, Enzo! I need to clear my head."

Enzo had suspected this was coming. After all, the prince's favorite activity was running away. "Oh, yes? And where would you like to…clear your head this time, sir? I hear the slopes are opening early in St. Moritz this year. Monte Carlo has opened a new casino," he suggested all while taking off Damon's shoes and hearing the sound of a crunch in Damon's mouth as the prince ate a long-awaited snack. "Dropping a few hundred thousand kroner always seems to have worked miracles in the past."

Damon flickered through the channels without saying anything to his caretaker, and when he turned the channel over, there was a loud, ominous tone.

"_Warning! The following commercial…" _Shards of animated black glass broke on the screen, and out broke a video of a girl lifting her top up. Naturally, this caused Damon's attention to spark. _"Wait! No time for that, watch this! For years, Desperate Diego has been talking real women into the most outrageous things! And he's captured it all on tape!" _There was another frozen image of a girl with her shirt lifted up and a black mark covering the place where her breasts would be. Nevertheless, the commercial continued. _"And now Desperate Diego takes you to the small-town jackpot to bring you _Wild College Girls: The Girls of Virginia!_" _

Damon laughed in his chair, unable to help it. "Enzo! Enzo, are you watching this?"

"Yes…sir, I'm…I'm definitely watching this," Enzo said uncomfortably, clearing his throat.

On the screen, this 'Desperate Diego' spoke to another one of these half-naked women. _"Oh, please. Come on; take your top off for us. Come on, just once." _

Without taking his eyes off the screen, Damon hummed.

"Enzo," he began, his voice very skeptical. "I'm quite positive I know where I would like to go to clear my head."

* * *

"_Virginia_?" Mary Salvatore asked her son in disbelief, in complete disbelief that her son wanted to go to somewhere so unimportant.

"Yes," Damon said proudly.

"Why there, son?" Giuseppe asked, trying not to be as quick to judge as his wife. In the room with the two parents and Damon were both Enzo and Stefan, who stared at Damon in disbelief. Stefan was quite amazed that his brother wanted to go to Virginia, himself, but at this sudden request, Stefan _knew _his brother was up to something. No good.

Damon took a moment of hesitation before answering. "Well…I've never spent much time in America before. And, I've been to all of the major cities…I'd like to know what it feels like to be in a small one. That way, I can meet ordinary…Americans." His parents did not seem convinced, but Damon did not once break a sweat. "Plus, there's a well-respected university with…interesting programs and a wide variety of extracurricular activities."

Though Damon did not show any sign of having bad intentions, Enzo coughed a ways away from them, receiving the joke that he was quite amazed and astounded at. Stefan looked over at Enzo with confused eyes, but then Mary chuckled to herself.

"This is _absurd_!" the dark-haired Italian queen exclaimed.

"Look, I see this as a real opportunity to find myself," Damon defended.

Mary laughed again. "Oh, Damon, _please!" _She was almost scoffing at the thought of her son actually wanting to "find himself" as he'd said. She reached forward and grabbed the papers beside her, all labeled with captivating titles of Damon's indiscretions. "This is just another in a series of escapades." She held up each paper one by one, labeling his shame. "Which, by the way, we finance. Inevitably ending up with you in some tabloid, embarrassing us and forcing you to come back to the palace to hide yourself until you convince us you have to go and find yourself yet _again_."

Damon was now through with arguing. His mother was making herself perfectly clear, and though his intentions weren't all that pure, he was still angry that she was so doubtful of him. Was it so wrong to want to have a little fun every once in a while? Was it so wrong to have a _life_? To Damon, being royal was not a life, it was a death sentence.

He rose from his chair and walked around it, still peeved at his mother's harsh words. "If I'm the embarrassment you believe me to be, then maybe you should just cut me off."

Mary choked, confused. "W-What are you saying?"

"I'm saying that I want to go and I'm going." This was no longer about college girls; this was about proving to his mother that he was serious about something. "And I neither require your money _nor _your permission."

With that said, Damon began to walk out of the study, shoving his plate to Enzo, who was right beside him while he walked away.

Mary called out his name as he rudely walked from the conversation. "Damon!"

Damon spun around on his heel. "I will _do this _on my own, Mother!"

Mary was now as angry as Damon, who had left the room promptly after his outburst. But her anger was a reflection of her disappointment she harbored. Giuseppe sighed beside his wife and shrugged. "Let him go," he suggested. "It seems nothing we do here is going to work. We've tried everything else to get him back on track. Maybe this is what he needs to stop being such a disappointment."

Mary let out a deep sigh. "Frankly, it's an encouragement that he even wants to try," she murmured, but looked up at her husband. "But I don't believe that his intentions are pure, Giuseppe. This is just another headline that'll be on next week's news," she sighed. "There needs to be someone with him to keep him in line."

Giuseppe's eyes moved over to their second son, who was unaware that he'd been looked at. "Stefan?" The youngest brother turned to meet Giuseppe's eyes. "Would you mind going with your brother to keep watch on him? We would pay for you, of course," he added.

Stefan was stunned, confused, almost. Eventually, he realized that he needed to obey orders, so he nodded. "Yes, sir," he promised, nodding curtly. "I will go with Damon."

Mary, who was biting on her lip, watched as Enzo moved forward and placed the tea and saucer that Damon had given him onto the table. "Enzo," she said abruptly, causing the dark-haired caretaker to look up. "You will go with them."

Enzo crossed his arms behind his back and straightened. "Me, Your Majesty?" he asked, confused and not all that excited. Mary nodded. "Well…surely there's a caretaker better suited than…" He trailed off seeing Mary's intent face, and Enzo immediately closed his mouth shut while backing up. "I will arrange for our departure."

* * *

**Yes, next chapter, Stefan, Enzo, and Damon will all arrive at Whitmore and then the real fun begins. Stefan's little addition to this is going to be fun. I love a little Stefan Salvatore here and there :P **

**Anyways, hope you all enjoyed! Until next time! Review**

**_Love, _**

**_BellaSalvatore1918_**

**_X_**


	3. Chapter 3

**Hey, everyone. Again, not a long chapter, but it'll have to do for now. I was thinking about merging chapters 3 & 4 in the movie, but it ended up working out this way so...here it is! I hope you enjoy. This chapter's been sitting in my doc. manager for a while now, so I jus thought I'd get it out. But I'm working on everything else and new chapters should start coming after finals (after Wednesday)!**

**Disclaimer: Refer to Chapter 1 :) By the way, Damon speaks Italian in this chapter and I am not afraid to admit that I used _Google Translate_ and the app _iTranslate _because, unfortunately, I don't know Italian. Normally, if Damon doesn't say what the words are, there'll be the English translation in brackets beside it, but he actually explains the words to Lucy, so that's why it's not there. Sorry if it's completely wrong, but I'm learning Latin not Italian :P**

* * *

**Chapter 3**

An airplane overhead zoomed past the Whitmore College campus while Lucy exited one of the classroom buildings getting the materials she was assigned for her Shakespeare class. She could just imagine how boring the class would be before it began. The noon sun beat down on Lucy as she walked off the steps of the building and into the narrow street between sidewalks, only to find herself almost run over by a fancy town car.

"Hey!" she shouted, stopping as the town car did too, in the middle of the street. "Watch where you're going!" _Asshole, _she thought to herself, but instead peered into the odd town car that was rolling around in the roadways of their small, off-the-radar campus. It was extremely unusual that there was a random town car roaming around. _Must be lost_, she decided.

Inside the extravagant vehicle, Damon peered out of the tinted windows in which Lucy could not see into. He rolled the window down and looked back at her as she walked away in an odd confusion. His dark sunglasses were shielding him, as well as the tinted windows, from the blazing warm sun.

"Just look at them all, Enzo," Damon sighed blissfully as he took off his sunglasses and looked around the campus to all the beautiful women with their beautiful friends. What he wasn't happy about was the fact that Stefan had to come on the trip with him and Enzo, but he had to deal. All he knew was that Stefan was clear on the fact that this wasn't a brother-bonding exercise. Damon would do his own thing when he wanted, whenever he wanted. Frankly, Stefan didn't want any part of it, either. "Thousands upon thousands of young, crazy college girls getting drunk and taking their tops off every night."

"You're disgusting, Damon," Stefan murmured with a sigh. The comment was ignored by Damon and the caretaker sitting beside the older brother that sometimes acted like the youngest.

"Yes, sir, what a treat for us that it's happening here in a town that no one in America has even _heard _of," Enzo mocked, but his voice was bland and dull.

Damon looked out the window and whistled. "Wow. Would you look at _her_?" He grunted out of approval, and this earned a sigh from Enzo beside him.

"Your parents _are_ expecting you to attend your classes, Your Royal Highness."

"Yes, I know," Damon agreed, almost tiredly. Then, he suddenly turned to Enzo, shifting away from the sights of beautiful blondes around the vehicle. "Listen, Enzo, from this point forward, I do not want you to address me as the Prince or Your Royal Highness. You will address me as Damon, all right? The last thing I need right now is to have the press all over me." Damon threw a glance at his brother. "I expect the same would be said for you, Stefan."

Stefan looked up at the dark-haired pretentious college boy in front of him. "I'm not the one who needs to be hidden from the tabloids, brother. It's your own doing that's made you run off to America and have Mother and Father drag me with you."

Damon rolled his eyes. "Please, Stefan. If you didn't want to come, all you had to say was no. Mother and Father _worship _the ground you walk on."

"Yes, because you _obliterate _the ground _you _walk on so there is none to worship when it comes to yours!"

Damon just sighed and turned to the window. "Regardless, I think this trip should be fun. Don't you think so, brother?"

Stefan sighed. "I'm having a wonderful time already, Damon."

Damon turned his head to look back at Stefan again. "Are you unhappy, Stefan?"

Stefan turned as well to look at his brother. "What gave me away?"

Damon wrinkled his nose. "You know, I'm not sure. Your expression never changes. Do you even know _how _to smile, brother?"

Stefan frowned at this and just scoffed, turning his head away from his brother who basked in the victory of his amusement. It wasn't a long time before they reached their dorm room building, where Enzo got out of the car first, as usual, and opened the doors for both the royal brothers, who were posing as commoners. Damon got out first, overlooking the wild college students hanging their body parts out of their room windows. Damon placed his sunglasses over his eyes again as he moved so Stefan could get out of the car as well, but he turned himself so he walked over to the trunk of the town car to grab his bags. Enzo and Stefan followed him, but Damon grabbed his bag and swung it over his shoulder before Enzo could take it from him.

Stefan had a different dorm room down a different hallway—no doubt one better than what Damon was allotted. Their parents didn't _cut _him off, per say, but they did give him a certain amount of cash and said no more. Damon didn't care, though—he was making a point out of this.

"Ah, Enzo, this is us." Kicking the door open, Damon brought his bags into the messy dorm room; they were told one other student would be living with them as well.

"Good heavens." Enzo made it a point to express his distaste for the lack of cleanliness in the typical college dorm room. Damon put his bags down and looked around the room under the pile of clothes and garbage that was surrounding the beds and floor. "I thought you had to be convicted of a crime before you lived somewhere like this."

Damon didn't respond, but instead walked around the room some more. It was a small area with a single computer in between the two bunk beds. A couch was positioned in front of the computer and it looked like it was another area for sleeping.

"It's not that bad." Damon shrugged. "It could be worse."

"What would be worse? Living in a prison cell?" Enzo said pointedly. Damon glanced up at the smart-ass caretaker.

"Yes, Enzo. _Exactly _that. But it doesn't matter anyways, I like it." Damon wasn't all that fond of it really, but he was making it a point to be right. He didn't want Enzo to be reporting to his parents that he was miserable. Plus, as soon as he had one of the beautiful college women in one of the bunk beds in the room, the size of it wouldn't matter. "I'll even let you have first choice of the beds. Go on." Damon gestured towards the bunk beds, but he stood by the bunk bed on the right of him.

"Oh! Heavens, uh…which stained mattress shall I choose?" Damon frowned at Enzo's pathetic joke that could be taken quite differently. Before they could continue over the rooming situation, someone walked through the threshold with a bunch of food situated in the person's arm. It was a twenty-something male stuffing food down his small throat. None of the junk food seemed to affect this male's stature—he was a scrawny gamer-type guy. Damon looked back at the computer and realized that his analysis was right: this guy was a gamer.

The boy stopped as soon as he saw Damon and Enzo, and then gestured at them. "You the new guys?" Both Enzo and Damon nodded. "I'm Jeremy." He moved over and put all of his food down on the small counter that was used as the kitchen, it was inferred. "All right, all the food's labeled so I'll_ know_ if you ate anything. The Xbox is off-limits. If you screw up any of my high scores, I'll…_blind _you with my laser pointer," he warned as he walked over to the couch in front of the computer and sat down.

"How wonderful," Enzo muttered to himself as he sighed and walked over to the bed across from the one Damon had unofficially claimed. Damon didn't say anything, but he was slightly worried—hopefully, this wasn't how everyone would be here.

* * *

Jeremy had referred Enzo and Damon to this place called the Grill on campus, and Damon decided he wanted to go. Enzo, obligated to go with him, asked Stefan if he wanted to go, and, unfortunately, he did. They picked Stefan out of his dorm room, which was ten times bigger than Damon and Enzo's. Damon wasn't going to lie—he was jealous, but there was nothing he could do. His parents worshipped Stefan and hated him, it was nothing different. He just brushed past it and moved on.

Loud music blasted in the bar/restaurant, and it crawled with students that were shouting and yelling in a drunken stupor. Seeing this normality made Damon smile, which was very rare.

"Ah, now this—_this_—is the real university I was talking about!" Damon shouted to Enzo and Stefan over the loud music, trying to make his point. "You see, here, we're just three typical college students. No one knows us and no one cares. It's refreshing."

"Absolutely, sir. I, for one, can't wait to raucously cheer on the fellows of the tackle football team as they challenge the Blue Devils, our hated rivals, who apparently hail from Duke University in North Carolina."

Suddenly, there was a squeal of a chair and someone threw an arm around Enzo, causing the caretaker to stiffen. "Duke _sucks_! Whitmore _rules_!" There was a loud roar of cheering across the entire restaurant that lasted for an entire minute while Damon, Stefan, and Enzo found an open table through the roar of the enthusiastic crowd. At first, Enzo spotted a free table, but a couple took it before he had the chance to, so he turned around and grabbed the next open table he saw. The entire restaurant was a disorganized mess—no hostess, no seating arrangements…it was a hassle in itself.

Enzo helped Damon shrug out of his black blazer, and the caretaker put the prince's jacket on the back of his chair and extended it outward. As Damon rolled back the sleeves of his button-down dress shirt, he elegantly sat down in the chair and Enzo pushed him in while Damon sat down. After helping Stefan as well, Enzo sat himself down in a chair and held up his fingers, to which Damon put down instantly.

"No, no." A long silence was deafening as Stefan and Enzo waited for Damon to take charge of this situation, and once Damon saw the standard black and white uniform of a waitress, he spoke loud, "Ah, waitress, we're like to see some menus, please."

Lucy turned around to face the table of three boys—or, rather, two boys and one very old man that did not look like he belonged in a college. The tone of the one who spoke was so condescending and snotty that she felt like throwing the rag she held in her hand at his face. The slight accent in his voice was what made her realize that whoever this guy was, he wasn't from anywhere around.

"I'm not a waitress," she told him slowly, "there are no menus and the kitchen is closed for the night."

She turned to walk away again, but the voice pulled her back. "Well, then, what can you offer us?"

Damon watched as the surprised blonde-haired, twenty-something girl turned back at him and let out a soft chuckle. He was genuinely confused, but she seemed rather amused.

"I can offer you beer and pretzel rods my fine fellow, at ye old pub yonder!" She gestured behind her in her act of an imitated accent. Damon frowned and watched as she just turned on her heel away from him and left. The way she spoke to him, it was _madness. _He'd never been spoken to before like that; _especially _not by a girl.

Stefan was chuckling beside Damon, which caused the older brother to turn his head. "What?" Damon almost snapped.

"I…I'm sorry," Stefan broke out during his chuckles. "Only, what I would've given to have that recorded."

Damon gave his brother a sour look before turning back to the girl who had so carelessly disregarded his presence. She was like the others in the school, as beautiful as the rest of them. She wore a blue t-shirt with the label of the restaurant printed at the breast, a black apron around her waist, and a rag was held in her hand. Damon looked over her features from afar—her golden hair, her blue eyes, her peachy skin. But she paid no mind to him, and it was a first for Damon.

"Shall I retrieve some drinks for us?" Enzo asked beside Damon, who didn't once take his eyes off of this mysterious, defensive girl. With the slight motion of a nod, Enzo pulled himself out of the chair and walked over to the bar to get drinks.

About three glasses later for Damon, two glasses later for Stefan, and only one glass later for Enzo, things were starting to get hazy. Stefan was watching the sports game that played on one of the small, old televisions hanging on the walls in the facility, Enzo was sitting like a stick, and Damon had his eyes set on one thing and one thing only—the waitress who'd been so rude to him. If it were someone he knew who had said those things…well, considering the fact that there was never anyone who'd ever spoken to him like that, he didn't know what to do. But he imagined that the person who'd been so rude towards him, if he were back in Italy, he would've condemned that person into isolation and never had given a second thought. Damon did not take well to people insulting him. If anyone was going to insult anyone, it would be him. If anyone was going to have fun, it would be him. There was a common trend in all of this.

But in America? In this town that no one had ever heard of the Crown Prince, Damon Salvatore? Damon found himself rather turned on than _angry. _Besides, how could one be so angry with a girl like that? Maybe it was amusing.

"Another, sir?" Enzo asked beside Damon, who didn't even remove his eyes from the girl behind the bar.

Stefan sighed beside Damon. "No, thank you, Enzo. I think I'm done for the night."

"Very well, sir. And you?" Enzo asked, turning his head towards Damon in prompt. Damon reluctantly removed his eyes and inhaled sharply.

"Uh…yes, Enzo, but I think I'll get this round. Would you like one?"

"No, sir," Enzo responded courteously before handing him the money for another cheap beer like they'd been enduring all night. Before heading over to the bar, Damon combed his fingers through his hair, unlinked a button on his dress shirt, and smoothed out the money in his hand as he rose from his chair on his own. He walked over to the bar, slowly and smoothly, and watched as the blonde-haired girl cleaned up glasses with the rag she'd replaced a beer ago.

"Hello, again," Damon said, his voice light. He was clearly affected by the alcohol, but just didn't care.

Lucy smiled at him, but it was a sad, annoyed smile. Something about him—the disheveled look, the fancy shirt, the gleaming elegant ring on his left middle finger—it was all too…wealthy, if that was even a reason to judge someone. She wasn't afraid to admit that, as of the moment, she was judging on the cover and not the book.

"What can I get for you?" she asked politely, trying to be nice to the foreign, possibly drunk dark-haired boy leaning on the bar countertop.

Damon sighed and looked around, pursing his lips. "Well, I was hoping you could recommend something better than what we've been having. Something a little stronger?"

She raised an eyebrow. "Something other than beer, or…?"

Damon opened his mouth, hesitated, and then shrugged. "It doesn't really matter," he admitted.

Lucy nodded and looked around the bar before turning back to him and sighing, "Well, we did get a new bottle of vodka in yesterday."

Damon shook his head. "Not a vodka kind of man," he said, looking around the shelves for something he'd like. She waited for him as his hazy blue eyes loomed around the alcohol shelves. "How about a glass of bourbon-whiskey? Just one."

She gave him another half-smile. "Coming right up." Without hesitation, she spun around and grabbed the glass of Jim Beam bourbon-whiskey that was collecting dust on the shelves around other popular alcohol. Turning around again, she walked to the other side of the bar and grabbed a cheap crystal glass. She noticed that Damon had followed her around the countertop, watching intently as she poured the glass of bourbon strategically.

"Non ho mai visito niente di più bello nella mia vita," Damon whispered, his eyes focused on her. Lucy looked up at him, recognizing the obvious change of language, and she rose an eyebrow.

"Italian?" she asked, confused.

Damon nodded. "It's the most beautiful language, isn't it?"

She stopped pouring the bourbon and put the bottle down on the counter. "I wouldn't know, I don't speak it. As for myself, I think this language is good enough." The fact that he spoke Italian to her worsened her irritation. Some snobby rich kid from Italy, of course. "You going to tell me what it means or am I going to have to download an app and make you repeat it for me?"

At her joke, Damon chuckled under his breath, ducking his head for a moment before looking up at her with an easy smirk. He hesitated, but seeing her impatience, spoke clearly now. "I said, 'I've never seen anything more beautiful in my life'."

He thought he'd impress her, but instead, the girl sighed. "Well, Jim Beam does make some beautiful bourbon, I'll agree."

"What?" Damon asked, raising his eyebrows. "No, I…" He saw the distaste in her eyes and realized that she said what she said for a reason, but he wasn't so willing to give up. He knew, he just knew, that she was enjoying this just as much as he was. He'd been with girls like her before—the shy, offensive type. They never could resist him in the end. "I'm Damon."

He stuck out his hand over the counter, and Lucy, hesitantly, took it. "Lucy." As quick as the handshake had started, she pulled her hand away and wiped it on her apron. "Um…is that it?"

Damon looked into the array of colors in her eyes, and shook his head. "Uh, no, actually." His eyes drifted from her bright circles towards her breasts, and he—being drunk—couldn't help himself. "So…will you take your top off for me?"

Lucy blinked at him. "Uh, _what_?"

Damon gestured at her top. "Take your top off for me! Like _Wild College Girls_."

She let her jaw drop, practically tripping over it as she realized how serious he was. "_Excuse _me?" Her question was almost a screech.

Damon shrugged and gave her a sly smile. "Just a quick look!" He looked around. "No one's watching. Just…take it off for me."

Now she was angry, which he realized a second before she spoke. "Who the _hell _do you think you are?" she asked, and her hand reached out as he opened his mouth, and the next thing Damon knew, _Sprite _was being thrown in his face by a high-powered soda sprayer behind the counter. In a matter of seconds, he was soaked in the sticky substance, practically drowning in the liquid.

Almost as if on cue, after Lucy put down the sprayer, two buff men came up to Damon and started to manhandle him, guiding him in the direction of the door. Damon, through his haze and the sight of soda around his eyelids, saw Enzo come up and start to argue, but they were both forced out of the restaurant without much effort from these two men who looked like they were captains of the lacrosse team.

Stefan, at his table, looked around at all of the regular college students. _"_I will give someone five hundred dollars if they happened to catch that on camera."

* * *

**I love playing with Stefan's character. He's so sassy sometimes. Anyways, I hope you all enjoyed that chapter and I'll update as soon as I can! **

_**Love, **_

_**BellaSalvatore1918**_

_**X**_


	4. Chapter 4

**Hey, everyone. Sorry it's been so long since my last update. I hope you enjoy the chapter! Review at the end if you can, please. **

**Disclaimer: Refer to Chapter 1 :)**

* * *

**Chapter 4**

Dr. Wes Maxfield stood at the front of his classroom/lab, pacing back and forth in the front of the room beside the chalkboard. His students were all dressed in white overcoats that they'd been issued at the beginning of the class and for the rest of the semester. As Dr. Maxfield went on about science and what it meant to him and what it would mean to the rest of them, an atomic model passed around the classroom to each of the students who more or less paid attention to his rambling.

"Grading is as follows," started Dr. Maxfield, earning the now undivided attention from his classroom of students. Lucy passed on the model she'd received to the girl farther down the table, and the girl took it graciously. "Forty percent for procedure. Fifty percent for lab work. And ten—"

In the middle of Dr. Maxfield's grading scale and Lucy taking two packets of orientation material from a TA, the students turned around to face the interruption of a late arrival of a student.

"May I help you?" Dr. Maxfield sighed exhaustedly, his tone irate. Lucy spotted the student at the threshold and stiffened before turning back around in her chair. It was the pervert from the Grill the night before, which was concerning. Beside him was the creepy thirty-year-old British companion of his, right on his tail.

Damon rushed into the room with Enzo trailing behind him, and he pulled out a piece of paper regarding his class schedule. "Yes. I believe I'm signed up for this class."

He passed the paper to the young, blonde-haired, blue-eyed teacher, who looked over the note of Damon's presence.

"Fine, Mr.…Salvatore," said Dr. Maxfield conceded. He folded up the paper and passed it back to Damon. "Next time, I suggest you be here by the start of the class. Otherwise, you'll be locked out." Damon nodded once and took the paper back in his hands. Dr. Maxfield then turned his attention to the party standing beside his student. "And what about you?"

Enzo raised his eyebrows and crossed his hands behind his back. "I'm…uh, auditing."

Dr. Maxfield shook his head. "Not this class. Too small. Take a seat, Mr. Salvatore." The professor gestured to the only open seat in the room—the one beside Lucy Taylor. He then walked away from the disruption and opened his conversation back up to the class. "As I was saying…forty percent, procedure; fifty percent, lab work…"

Damon turned to Enzo, who was reluctant about leaving him. "Just wait for me outside."

"You'll be all right, sir?" Enzo whispered back, earning Damon to raise his eyebrows at him as the teacher went on in the background. Lucy watched from her upfront seat, her mouth practically dropping to the floor upon seeing the two men whisper with each other in a secretive way.

"Yes, Enzo, I'll be fine, just wait outsi—"

"You know," Dr. Maxfield interrupted, gaining the attention of the two men at the front of the classroom. Both dark-haired males turned to him. "If this is a 'lovers thing', could you please take it in the hall?"

Damon laughed at the remark. "'Lover's thing'? No. No, of course not." Without removing his eyes from the professor, Damon elbowed Enzo in the stomach. "Wait for me outside, Enzo. I'll find you when the class is over," he hissed.

"But—"

"Go," Damon whispered, and without another order, Enzo reluctantly left the Crown King's side and began to exit the classroom. Damon sighed and looked at Dr. Maxfield with a slightly apologetic expression. "My sincerest apologies."

Dr. Maxfield just stared at him and then gestured to the open seat beside Lucy. "Have a seat, Mr. Salvatore."

Damon nodded and moved forward, eyeing the blonde-haired girl who gave him a stare that could put any man to shame. But he didn't break a single sweat as his signature smirk appeared across his features and he swung himself up on the lab stool, disregarding Lucy's stinging gaze beside him. Upon his obedience from the instruction Dr. Maxfield gave him, the teacher continued.

"And ten percent, _attendance,_" Dr. Maxfield said shortly. "You will find a list in front of you of your supplies and the experiment you will be conducting."

Beside Damon, Lucy took the extra packet the TA had given her and dropped it in front of Damon with distaste that he clearly caught onto. She kept her eyes peeled on her own paper regardless of the small glance Damon snuck at her. At the front of the classroom, Dr. Maxfield continued.

"Now, I want you all to turn to the person next to you and introduce yourself." Around the classroom, all of the students shook hands with the person beside them—all students but Lucy and Damon. "Remember that name, class. Because it's the name of your _permanent _lab partner for the rest of the semester."

Lucy dropped her paper upon the notion that she would have to spend the entire semester with the guy she'd sprayed high-powered soda with after he asked her to take her top off. Her eyes expressed nothing but shock and denial, and Damon watched as she came to the realization that she was screwed. He didn't like to be looked at that way—especially by a woman. It was something that, before that moment, he had never experienced before. She didn't look at him like he was a wealthy prince; she looked at him like he was a jerk that she didn't want to be around.

Which, in a way, made it more fun for him, of course.

Lucy chased after Damon, who had left the science building with Enzo by his side. The sunlight beat down on the two of them, but they kept their eyes shielded by their designer sunglasses.

"Hey!" Lucy shouted, running after Damon while trying to keep her bag on her shoulder. Damon came to a stop in the walkway, pulling Enzo to a stop as well. The blonde rushed up to him and extended the piece of paper he'd forgotten back in the classroom. "You forgot your supply list. You're responsible for half that stuff, you know."

The dark-haired prince took the paper out of her hand. "Oh. Right, thank you." He passed the paper onto Enzo, who took it with confusion but nevertheless looked over it. Lucy, who was struggling to keep pace behind the two of them, just scoffed and ran in between the space between the two men, intent upon giving a lecture she didn't want to have to give.

"Look," she began, pulling Damon to another stop. "What's your name again?"

"Damon."

"Damon?" Lucy questioned, and Damon nodded to it. "All right, then…_Damon_. You see, this class is…_really _important to me right now. I need this teacher to get me into med school—"

"Med school?" Damon interrupted her, raising an eyebrow over his sunglasses. Lucy eyed him carefully, and she could see the doubt that was written all over his smug face. "Sorry, I don't mean to be rude, it's just…you don't look like—"

"The smart type?" Lucy filled in, her voice bitter. Damon opened his mouth, but she took words for him. "Right. I'm blonde, I'm pretty, and guys like you just _can't _seem to figure out why the hell I would want to do something so…empowering, right? I would be much more suited to be some…brainless slut in a porno."

Damon removed his sunglasses now, pulling them to his side and sighing. "Last night, I…well, you're the aspiring doctor… you should be aware. A large supply of alcohol mixed with a carbon-based life form causes the life form to blurt out stupid things. So I apologize for it. I was just having some fun."

Lucy scoffed. "Right. Of course you were. And it's _so _much fun to be asked to take your top off for some sloppy lush who just can't keep it in his _pants_. So thanks. It was great." She gave him a sour smile and patted Damon on the shoulder before turning and walking away. Instead, Damon called her back with words he had learned in his boarding school back in Great Britain.

"'I have learned me to repent the sin of disobedient opposition. To you and your behests, I am enjoined and beg your pardon.'" Damon paraphrased the passage from Romeo and Juliet, nodding his head once towards the blonde college girl in front of him. Lucy crossed her arms over her chest and eyed Damon.

"Have you been hitting the early morning Happy Hour or are you literally just being an ass?"

Damon looked at Enzo, who had made his way beside the prince, and then over at Lucy. "It's a play. You know, _Romeo and Juliet_?" Lucy straightened upon hearing the words. "Shakespeare?" Damon tried, but the blonde just shook her head and laughed.

"Well…this is going to be one _hell _of a semester." She was silent for a moment, but then sighed. "Look, I _really _can't afford to have you screwing things up for me right now, okay? So…please. Make sure you get your half of the supplies. And for future reference, don't forget them."

She didn't wait for him to respond and start another conversation with a quote from Shakespeare this time; instead, she walked off into the crowd of busy college students, frustrated beyond belief.

* * *

"I mean, how much clearer could I have been?" Lucy scoffed as she ranted to Hannah, who was lounging on the couch beside her, flicking through the television channels. Her computer was open on her lap, but she paid no attention to it, completely distracted by the "I sprayed the guy with high powered soda. You'd think he'd get the universal message to stay away."

"You're being a little hard on the guy, Luce, don't you think?" Hannah tried to reason with her friend while changing the television channel. The blonde beside her sighed. "Look, I met his brother today. He's actually a really nice—"

"Damon has a brother?" Lucy asked, taken by surprised. Hannah glanced over at Lucy, her eyes peering up as far as they could over the couch's arm.

"Yeah. He's in my anthropology class. If his brother looks anything like _him_…" Hannah whistled suggestively. Lucy scoffed again and shifted in her seat to try and get ready to start on the assignment she had pulled up. "What? Isn't he hot?"

"Hot? Oh, my God, Hannah. He's so affected. He was quoting _Shakespeare _to me. What kind of normal person quotes Shakespeare to someone they just met?" Her tone was full of unwanted judgment, but Hannah ignored it. It was a common routine with Lucy Taylor when she was stressed.

"Well, maybe he can help you with your Shakespeare class." Hannah brought herself up on her elbows and shifted so she was turned around to Lucy. "A little _one-on-one _tutoring?" Lucy's eyes glanced up and gave her friend a glazed stare. The brunette just chuckled and flopped onto her back. "Come on. You're telling me that you _wouldn't _take this guy up to the stacks?"

Lucy snorted. "Okay. First of all, going at it in the dusty stacks of the library is…actually pretty disgusting if you think about it. Secondly, you say that about _every _single hot guy."

"So you admit that he's hot!"

"I'm not admitting _anything_!" The blonde said, frustrated as she turned to her nosy friend. "And I…I don't really want to talk about it anymore, it's just giving me more of a headache."

"Okay, fine." Hannah shrugged and returned to her own business, flickering through the channels on her new TV. But, after a few seconds of silence, Lucy just couldn't resist.

"And what's with that…weird friend of his that's always following him?"

The next morning, Dr. Maxfield walked the aisles of his classroom, overseeing his students as they completed the experiment that they were conducting together. Carefully, he took them step-by-step through the process, but stopped for no one.

"One partner should monitor the temperature and flow while the other pours the hydrochloric acid into the separate funnel."

Lucy did as the professor told her, but she did it differently than all the other students—alone. Her partner was nowhere to be seen, even halfway through the class. She tried to keep up with Dr. Maxfield's instructions, but she didn't have someone else to help her with any of it.

"Now, carefully turn the stopcock to allow some of the solution to flow into the round-bottom flask."

Following Dr. Maxfield's instructions, Lucy took the hydrochloric acid beside her and opened the separated funnel to pour the acid into the space allotted. She let her other hand travel down and she turned the stopcock, where the solution mixed with the bottom flask. She thought she was doing everything correctly; instead, there was a violent bubbling sound, and the next time her eyes moved over to her experiment workspace, there was a loud breaking noise. Everyone in the class turned to watch as Lucy's experiment exploded out of its contained space and spewed all over the floor. Beside her, Dr. Maxfield came to a stop with a disappointed look on his face.

"Start over again."

After class ended, a very angered Lucy Taylor found her best friend chatting up a storm with some bronze-haired, strong-built, well-kept boy. Immediately after Hannah and her new friend exited the classroom, Lucy rushed over to them, pissed off to say the least.

"Hey, Luce," Hannah greeted kindly as her blonde-haired best friend walked over to them both. Lucy nodded and eyed the boy beside her. "Oh! Uh, this is Stefan Salvatore. You know, Damon's brother."

Stefan sighed. "I'm also a various array of other things, but yes. I am Damon's brother. You're…the girl from the restaurant the other night, correct?"

"Yeah. I am," Lucy agreed, relaxing in just the slightest to carry the conversation. "Lucy."

Stefan nodded. "I apologize for Damon's behavior the other night, he's…very direct."

Lucy scoffed. "Yeah. No kidding. Speaking of your brother, do you mind telling me where I can find him?" She tried to keep her anger in check in front of her flaky lab partner's brother, and to her gratitude, it worked. Stefan told her where to find Damon if he wasn't already in class, which Lucy knew for a _fact _that he wasn't. She came in like a storm, knocking one on the room door before blatantly barging inside.

Enzo turned around, taking a short hesitation from his cooking, to see Lucy standing at the door. He barely got one word out before the angered blonde just threw her hands up.

"Where is he?"

Enzo looked to the other side of the room silently, and Lucy glanced over the small, obviously masculine dorm room that was covered in junk food and clutter. Her eyes skimmed over the gamer at the very center of the room, and then finally turned to the side, where she saw Damon snoring away in his bed, completely obvious.

"You're still asleep?" she shouted, waking up the sleeping Salvatore in his bed. Enzo immediately tried to calm things down to a cooler level.

"Uh, good morning, Miss. Would you care for some breakfast?"

She ignored his question. "I just spent the last two hours looking like an _idiot _because my lab partner didn't show up!"

Damon groaned and forced himself up on his elbows, where he rubbed his eyes. "Oh…was that this morning?"

"Yes it was this morning!" Lucy shouted, probably waking up everyone in the dorm room. Damon stared at her curiously, and she stepped forward without taking a break. "You know, I know _exactly _who you are!"

"You do?" Enzo asked, surprised.

"You do?" Damon repeated, surprised himself. They both thought that she had figured it out—figured out that he was the Crown Prince of Italy.

"Yes, I do! You're just some spoiled rich kid who sees college as nothing but a bunch of parties and easy-going girls who will just bend to your every command! You see it as a _detour _on your way to an easy life." Damon wanted to sigh in relief because she didn't figure his secret out, but instead, he realized that she was insulting him. He found it quite amusing, watching as her cheeks flushed red with anger. "But you're just a royal pain in the _ass_!" She jabbed at her chest. "_My _ass!"

Damon sighed. "You're completely wrong." Enzo hastily rushed forward and handed Damon his breakfast plate, and the prince straightened in his bed. Lucy scoffed.

"Yeah. Sure. I'm wrong. Meanwhile, your butler is literally _serving _you your breakfast." She shook her head and crossed her arms. "You know, some people have to _earn _things in life. And that's the glorious beauty of a meritocracy! People rise and fall based on how _hard _they work."

Damon sampled the food on his plate, but Lucy's lecture was put on hold when Enzo interrupted, "Would you like some more hollandaise, Damon?"

"Mm," Damon mumbled while he tasted his food. "That's very good, thank you."

Lucy whipped around. "You're making _eggs Benedict?" _

"Mmhmm," Enzo answered.

"On a hot plate in a _dorm room_?"

"Yes, just a typical student breakfast." Lucy widened her eyes and scoffed to herself. _Typical. _"Would you care to join us?"

Behind her, Damon got out of his bed and walked down the short latter to the ground, his plate in his left hand while the other one stabilized him. Lucy just sighed, exasperated.

"No, thanks. I'm good." She turned back to Damon's bed to continue her discussion, but instead, she found him standing right in front of her, his bare chest exposed to her will. He was in nothing but a pair of boxers that he found unnecessary, but was ordered to wear them in a room containing three men.

"So…where's your statue?" Damon asked her, swallowing part of his breakfast. Though she was uncomfortable, Lucy just swallowed and answered with another question.

"What statue?"

"Well, someone as righteous as you are must have some sort of statue of themselves somewhere. Otherwise, you'd just be classified as a bitch."

Lucy's mouth dropped open. "Are you calling me a bitch?"

"Depends." Damon circled her. "Do you have a statue somewhere?" His lips turned up into a smirk, and she just scoffed as he stepped closer.

"There's a difference between being _righteous _and being _right. _I happen to be _right_. Could you please put a goddamn shirt on or something!" she rushed out. Damon looked down at his bare chest and just shrugged.

"If you're going to be a doctor, you're going to have to get used to naked men standing in front of you." Again, he smirked. "I'd be more than willing to practice with you, if you need help." His voice dropped to a whisper and he leaned forward, causing the blonde-haired student to lean back. "But I'd prefer to _really _be naked for those times."

Lucy stood there, watching as his lips curled into a sick grin and he leaned back to watch her reaction. She opened her mouth to retort, but instead, the previously unaware male in the room took her words.

"Dude! Dude, there's a chick in our room!" Jeremy shouted, pointing to Lucy with a slaphappy grin. Lucy ran a hand through her golden hair and turned back to Damon.

"Look, just drop the damn class," she requested.

Damon shook his head and smiled. "No." He shoved a spoonful of his breakfast into his mouth and watched as Lucy groaned.

"Fine! Fine, but you better _be _there next time and you better damn well be _prepared." _Without furthering the conversation, she bumped Damon's shoulder and walked around him to the exit of the room, leaving promptly. Damon stood in his room afterwards, just amused at the situation. The door closed with a slam, and Damon moved over to the small table by the tiny closet at the front of the room.

"You know…she really meant those things, didn't she?" Damon asked Enzo, who picked up the scorching hot iron in his hand.

"Yes, she did seem rather upset, sir." Damon sat down in the chair and put his plate down. "Though, regardless, I…don't see why you would care." Enzo picked up the boxers he was ironing and sighed. "Do enjoy the eggs, sir. They were purchased with the last of your money."

Damon scoffed. "Well, we do have some left, don't we?"

"What you came with is gone."

Damon frowned. "Stefan will help." Enzo peered up at the Crown Prince, who just sighed. "All right, you're probably correct. Stefan wouldn't help me if my life depended on it." There was a silence that loomed over the room, but then Damon inhaled. "Well, you are getting some sort of paycheck, aren't you, Enzo?"

The dark-haired servant stopped ironing Damon's clothes and looked up at the prince with eyes that forced Damon into reality. He was broke, being cut off from his parents. The only option left was to get money somehow. The answer was simple, but it was also foreign to the prince.

A _job_.


	5. Chapter 5

**Hi, guys. Sorry it's been a while since my last update, but here it is! One thing you need to know about the Grill is that, despite the fact that it's the Grill, it doesn't look the same. Has the same uniforms, but it looks like the restaurant in the movie. I had to keep it that way because of the jukebox and the sandwich station, so it was just a heads up. Anyways, enjoy! Review at the end please!**

**Disclaimer: Refer to Chapter 1 :)**

* * *

**Chapter 5**

"Polo fencing…car racing…speaks Italian, English, French, German…" Liz Forbes looked up at Damon and raised an eyebrow. "You really can do it all, can't you?"

Damon chuckled to himself. "I'd like to think so, yes."

Liz scoffed to herself. "Well, look. All of that is great and everything, but it has nothing to do with this job. I hire students with work experience, and…well, Mr. Salvatore, you don't have any."

She began to rise from her seat, but Damon was determined to get the job. If he didn't, it would be the next plane out to Rome again. "Look, I could _really _use the employment."

Liz nodded. "I'm sure you can, but there are a lot of students here at Whitmore who want to work here. Qualified students," the owner clarified as she turned to leave. Damon scrambled, trying to salvage what he had left without using the "I'm a Prince" card.

Suddenly, an idea sparked as if a light bulb went off on the top of his head. Did he dare? The answer to that question was simple. Yes, he did. Desperate times did call for desperate measures, after all.

"Well, I have the highest recommendation," Damon told Liz, earning her to stop and turn around, intrigued.

"A recommendation? From who?"

Damon stared at Liz, who was waiting for an answer, and he took in a breath. If she didn't already hate him now, she would soon enough.

* * *

"Hey, Lucy," Liv Parker greeted her co-worker as Lucy walked into the Grill, placing her apron over her waist. Lucy gave the other blonde a smile.

"Hey, Liv. How's it going?"

"Good. You?" Liv responded. Lucy just sighed and focused on tying the strings around her black apron just at her hip.

"I'm good, thanks." The blonde gave the other a smile, and Lucy began to walk to her station manning the sandwiches. She thought everything was normal, of course, but that was until she saw Damon Salvatore behind the glass display case, placing plastic gloves over his hand as if he was actually going to handle the meat. Her answer she'd given to Liv suddenly became a lie, and she stormed over to Damon, who looked ready to meet her fury.

"Lucy," Damon greeted with a smile. Once she reached him, she wasted no time with hellos.

"Okay, either this is some sick joke or you're _deliberately _trying to make my life a living hell," Lucy accused him, putting a hand on her hip. Damon couldn't resist smirking to himself.

"Don't be ridiculous. I'm simply manning the delicatessen in the event that one of my…fellow students wants a _tasty_ sandwich," Damon responded, giving her a light smile. Everything that came out of his mouth just sounded like an innuendo, whether it was that he meant it to or that he was just that way by nature. A furious Lucy turned around at Liz, who was on the Grill's landline.

"Liz!" Lucy hissed, scoffing. She hitched her thumb back at Damon. "Did you hire this guy?"

Liz nodded. "Uh huh. He came highly recommended."

"What?" Lucy asked, incredulous. "Who the hell would recommend him?"

Liz raised an eyebrow at her. "Um…Lucy, _you _did. He came by _your _recommendation."

Lucy blinked, and in mere seconds, her eyes widened. "_What_?" She did no such thing, but Liz waved her off, telling her that Damon was her responsibility now. Meanwhile, a blonde-haired, blue eyed, fresh-faced fellow student of his looking for a sandwich greeted Damon at the counter.

"What would you like?" Damon asked the student.

"I'll have a turkey sandwich," the student answered. As Lucy turned around, Damon was looking back and forth between all of the meats underneath the glass display. He inhaled sharply.

"Ah…it seems we're _completely _out of turkey today."

The student raised an eyebrow, puzzled. "Uh…dude. There's like ten turkey things in there."

Damon frowned at the student. "Dude? Really?" he questioned, his voice full of distaste. But regardless, he looked down at the meats in the display case and, beyond confused, turned to Lucy for guidance. The blonde, seeing Damon's helplessness, rolled her eyes and grabbed a pair of gloves for herself while going off.

"Is this some sort of test?" Lucy asked, sliding the gloves onto her hands. "Did Harvard send you to see if I can handle the pressure? Because, I gotta tell you, if you keep this up, I think I might crack." She reached into the display case with her gloved hands and held out the turkey for Damon, who just pointed at the turkey.

"Who's in charge of the carving?"

Lucy looked at him with disgust and sheer perplexity. "Use the slicer!" she told him roughly, tossing the turkey to him. Damon blinked down at the turkey.

"What's that?"

Lucy bit down on her lip and held up her hands, shaking them almost frantically. "Oh, my _God. _I cannot believe this," she hissed and grabbed the turkey from Damon, storming off to the slicer in the kitchen. Damon left the student awaiting his sandwich at the display case and went to Lucy, who put the turkey into the slicer and accused Damon immediately as his presence was known to her. "You used me as a reference when I didn't even give you a recommendation."

Damon nodded. "Yes, I did." Lucy scoffed angrily, and Damon sighed. "Look, do you actually think that I _want _this job? _I _do not wait on people, people wait on _me_."

Lucy rolled her eyes again. "I've gathered that."

"Regardless"—Damon ignored her, shaking his head—"I really do need this job. I have…no more money left."

"And yet you have a personal egg poacher, right?" Lucy reminded Damon, looking out into the restaurant, where Enzo was reading a book. He had insisted on accompanying Damon, like always. Damon tried to downplay Enzo's role in his life.

"Him? No, no. No. He's…just another student," Damon defended.

"Really?" Lucy challenged. "What's he studying? How to be a thirty-year-old junior? Try the 'on' button." Angrily, she gestured towards the button on the side of the slicer, and Damon flipped it on so it hummed to let them know that it was running. Their eyes locked, and Damon tried not to find amusement in the situation for he knew it would only upset her.

"Look, Lucy," Damon began, stepping closer to her. "You were right about my parents back in Italy. They are from…a certain wealth." _Royalty, _he wanted to correct himself, but refrained. "But what I've done is, I've cut myself off from them."

"Dude!" the irritable student awaiting his turkey sandwich interrupted. An annoyed Damon turned to the blue-eyed, blonde-haired student with a hard stare.

"Call me 'dude' one more time," Damon warned, holding up his index finger to express his seriousness. The student gave a frustrated sigh and Damon just gave him a tight smile. "We'll have your sandwich ready _momentarily." _Damon turned back to Lucy, sighing. He could see the hint of a smile on her face, but she looked up at him and dropped the smile. "Lucy, I realize that I have taken unfair advantage of you recently and…well, just give me a second chance today and if I cause any problems, then I'll quit."

Lucy looked at him, as if debating whether or not to trust him. Damon waited, but eventually, Lucy cleared her throat and agreed, stepping to the slicer.

"Okay. Your right hand goes on the handle," she instructed, demonstrating it for Damon, who stood behind her. She could feel the light breath on her neck, but decided to ignore it and continue instructing him, demonstrating as she went. "Slowly slide the meat back and forth. And, unless you intentionally want to lose a thumb for some reason, _don't _put your hand anywhere near the blade when it's moving, okay?"

"Right," Damon agreed, and Lucy stepped to the side after cutting one slice. She gestured to the machine so Damon could take over, and he did, stepping forward and placing his right hand on the blade like she said to. He began to slide the panel back and forth, but he didn't even realize it when his hand was too close to the blade. Luckily, Lucy grabbed his hand and chastised him for the gesture, bringing his hand down from the top of the machine. Lucy watched as Damon slid the panel back and forth more, but he banged the sides of the machine in a way that wasn't proper for it.

Lucy walked around him and reprimanded, "Slowly! Slowly." Damon nodded, trying to move the panel slower this time so it didn't bang as loud as before. Lucy's hand hovered over his own and she nodded in approval. Suddenly, her hand was on top of his and she moved the panel backward and forward with him. "Nice and smooth. There."

Damon turned, just a fraction, but he didn't have to move much for them to be merely inches apart. Her perfume filled his nostrils, but he found it completely and utterly intoxicating. He'd never been in this sort of situation before, and it was intriguing to him. The girls at home would throw themselves at him, and he always enjoyed that one detail about his life. What about this time was different? Was it because he wasn't a prince? That couldn't be the case. Damon didn't have to be royalty to get what he wanted.

Lucy was different than all the others. Girls would typically fight over him. Her? At the first sign of something intimate, she just took her hand off of Damon's and laughed to herself.

"I think that's enough," she scoffed and left him standing by the spinning slicer, only wanting more.

* * *

An hour later, Caroline and Bonnie greeted their friend Lucy at the bar she operated after Liv took over waitressing. Damon was waiting tables, something that was interesting to watch. He failed miserably, but it was impressively amusing. Caroline and Bonnie had seen some of this failure, and while Bonnie laughed at it, Caroline just cooed.

"Ooh," Caroline said, Damon having obviously caught her eye. "Who is _that_?"

"Damon Salvatore," Lucy told Caroline while cleaning off the glasses behind the bar with a clean rag. "Remember? My Chemistry partner?"

Caroline bit down on her plump, pink lip. "Wow. What _I _would kill to have Chemistry with him," she murmured huskily. Lucy rolled her eyes while Bonnie slapped Caroline's arm.

"Caroline," Bonnie hushed. Caroline shrugged and held her hands up in defense.

"What? He's _hot_," she admitted, as if it were obvious.

"He has an accent, too," Lucy added, just to watch Caroline's mouth drop open with desire. "And he's Italian."

"Lucy, stop!" Caroline whined, almost whimpering at her. Lucy just smiled. "You're going to make me go over and hit on him and make a complete _ass _of myself!"

"Well, it's not like you haven't done it before," Bonnie confessed, shrugging to Caroline. Caroline made an offended sound, but she admitted her guilt. After all, she did sleep with a forty-five year old British guy over the summer and had openly admitted to it. Nevertheless, Caroline refrained from going over to talk to Damon still, intent upon him making the first move.

Meanwhile, Damon brought drinks over to his brother and a girl, to Damon's surprise. This special girl intrigued Damon, so he jumped at the chance to interrupt.

"I have your drinks," Damon announced, setting down the tray and giving the pair their beers. Damon scoffed. "Beer, brother? What, didn't want to go for the wine?"

Stefan sighed and looked over at Hannah, who was waiting for an introduction. "Hannah, this is Damon, my brother. Damon, this is Hannah. The girl from my anthropology class."

Damon smirked at Hannah. "Lovely to meet you, Hannah. I hope my brother's not too much of a bore."

"He's fine," Hannah chimed, giving Damon a smile. She sensed the uneasy amount of tension between the two brothers and just let out a long breath of air. Spotting Lucy, Caroline, and Bonnie at the bar, she pointed to them. "Oh, look. I should go say hi to my friends. Excuse me." Without something else, Hannah rose from her seat and walked over the bar, leaving Damon and Stefan alone.

"So…" Stefan looked at Damon's new uniform and gave a light smile. "How's working life treating you, brother?"

Damon frowned at him. "One more word, Stefan, and I tell your little girlfriend of how you cry yourself to sleep with your _teddy bear._"

Stefan grimaced at Damon. "Don't you have a job to get back to? You've already crashed my date."

Damon smirked down at his brother. "So this _was _a date?" Stefan frowned, his expression the same, brooding face as always. Damon sighed. "Fine. Fine. Don't share. Keep all that pent-up tension built up inside of you. Probably better anyway." The eldest brother shrugged and turned, returning to his job. He may have hated working, but there was one thing he always loved doing—teasing his brother. With that, no matter where he was in the world, he would always feel the same.

* * *

"Here, Lucy, it's your turn tonight," Liv told Lucy as she gave the other waitress a few coins for the jukebox. Closing time had arrived and everyone was cleared out of the Grill except for the staff and Damon's weird friend. Lucy nodded to Liv.

"Thanks," she said and turned to the jukebox. She inserted the coins into the slot and picked the first good song she could find to play while everyone was clearing up. One of her secret obsessions happened to be with Elvis Presley, so it wasn't a surprise when she picked "Can't Help Falling in Love" to play from the machine, feeling in the mood for one of his slower songs.

She and Liv cleared off the tables while Damon swept the floor and grabbed the trash, much to his distaste. With a bottle of disinfectant in one hand and a rag in the other, Lucy sprayed the liquid onto one table and swayed back and forth to the music playing overhead. Damon caught sight of her as she leaned down to wipe the table, the tips of her blonde hair spilling over her shoulders and arms. When she finished cleaning one table, she swayed to the next one, mouthing Elvis's lyrics.

Damon found himself fascinated with the way she danced, not caring about who saw her. His eyes focused on her unintentionally, like she had sucked him in somehow. Maybe it was his obsession with her being different, but he was highly doubtful of it. Sure, he'd really…_seen _her in a different way than he saw most women, and this was due to the fact that she yelled, she kicked, she screamed, but when he watched her as she moved her hips and placed chairs over tables, Damon felt something he'd never felt before come over as a wave. It was something…_strange. _Something nice. She was normal compared to his world, and normality was something that he needed desperately. It didn't help his case that she was outstandingly beautiful, either. He would know, having seen _thousands _of beautiful women over his lifetime.

Damon caught himself staring, at last, and averted his eyes. A look of confusion flashed across his handsome features, but he forced himself away from Lucy. The golden girl who swayed to the music had now stopped when another song played, and she and Liv quickly finished up putting the chairs over the tables. They were the first ones to be able to leave, and Caroline had so graciously come back to the Grill to walk with Lucy back to the dorms. Lucy wanted to think that it was for her, but she knew the real reason, and she couldn't say she was surprised. Damon, of course, was on Caroline's radar, and even if Caroline wanted _him _to make the first move, she was sure it wouldn't last. Caroline would be throwing herself at him by the end of the week.

Enzo, who had fallen asleep at his table earlier, had finally woken up as Damon was living the trash bags up from the cans.

"Do you want me to give you a hand, Sir?" Enzo asked politely. Damon sighed, hating being coddled by Enzo.

"No, Enzo, thank you. I'm fine," Damon muttered.

"Hey," Caroline greeted Lucy at the bar. "You ready to go?"

"Yep," Lucy agreed, and they began to walk towards the exit. But when Lucy spotted Damon taking the trash bag out of the can, she stopped and bit down on her lip. Damon didn't notice her presence, but she spoke, earning his attention. "Damon?" He looked up at her with his captivating blue eyes, and she gave him a small smile. "I just…wanted to tell you that you did okay…_here_." She looked around the Grill, making her subject known.

Damon scoffed. "You're serious?"

Lucy shrugged. "Well, I guess there's a little room to reflect on the 'okay' part…" Damon chuckled at her words, but she smiled. "Seriously. You'll be fine. And it's not like you would've quit anyway. We both know that," she pointed out. Damon stared at her, almost as if admiring her skills at deduction.

"Well, I told you how much I need this job," Damon admitted, earning Lucy to nod. Things went silent for a while before Damon finally realized the presence of the other blonde beside Lucy, and she caught onto the diversion in his eyes.

"Oh! Sorry, um…Caroline, this is Damon. Damon, this is my friend, Caroline," Lucy introduced. Caroline and Damon smiled at each other, and Damon could easily read her like his favorite book. His earlier thoughts of it not being his social status that was the problem with his relationship with Lucy was confirmed, but he quickly cut his eyes from Caroline to Lucy.

"So…Lucy, there's this party on Saturday evening," Damon began, fearless. Lucy, caught off guard, looked over at him and raised an eyebrow. "I was wondering if you wanted to go with me?"

Lucy bit down on her lip, and she could feel the fury radiating off of Caroline. She could practically hear Caroline's thoughts: _as if it weren't bad enough that she stole my boyfriend…_

"Actually," Lucy chimed, turning to Caroline. "I'm not one for parties, but…uh…Caroline here…Caroline's a _sucker _for them." She gave Damon a wavering smile, and Damon moved his eyes from Lucy to Caroline. Damon was beyond confused, seeing as he asked Lucy out on a date and she just shoved him off to her friend.

But Damon wasn't an idiot, and he could pick up on a hint. One glance to Lucy and he could tell that she wasn't interested, and it crushed him like a boulder. He looked over at Caroline, who had a hopeful gleam in her eye. Damon gave her a tight smile. "Sure. The party's at the Sigma Kappa Beta fraternity. I can…meet you there."

"Great," Caroline agreed happily. Damon kept his smile on his face and his eyes flickered between Lucy and Caroline until Lucy finally spoke.

"Well, goodnight, Damon."

He didn't say anything back, he just watched as Lucy and Caroline both left the Grill, Caroline already starting to plan exactly how their future night was going to go. Damon sighed watching them leave, and Enzo's voice rang in his ear as the caretaker stood from his seat.

"Oh, dear," Enzo said gravely. Damon turned his head at him.

"What?"

"I believe you just got rejected, Sir."

"Caroline agreed to go with me." But Damon knew what Enzo was referring to, and Enzo said exactly what Damon was thinking.

"Yes, but you originally asked Miss Lucy to go first and she brushed you off. Rejection," Enzo clarified.

Damon was silent for a very long time, and he ended up inhaling sharply. "You know, I believe that's the very first time something like that's happened to me."

"You've never been attracted to anyone who didn't know you were a prince before." Damon fell silent again. "I wouldn't get too worked up over it, Sir. The chances of a relationship between yourself and Miss Lucy aren't promising. You two are of a completely different caliber."

Damon scoffed hearing this. "Enzo, I'm not that shallow. Just because she isn't _royalty _doesn't mean she isn't important."

Enzo _tsked. _"The higher caliber I was referring to, Sir, was _hers_."


End file.
